Memorials and Other Papers — CompleteDe Quincey, Thomas
General
Memorials and Other Papers — Complete
De Quincey, Thomas
English essays
undoubtedly our two Laxton baronesses shone advantageously amongst
them. A boy like myself could lay no restraint upon the after-dinner
feelings of the gentlemen; and almost uniformly I heard such verdicts
passed upon the personal attractions of both, but especially Lady
Massey, as tended greatly to soothe the feelings of Lord Massey. It is
singular that Lady Massey universally carried off the palm of unlimited
homage. Lady Carbery was a regular beauty, and publicly known for such;
both were fine figures, and apparently not older than twenty-six; but
in her Irish friend people felt something more thoroughly artless and
feminine--for the masculine understanding of Lady Carbery in some way
communicated its commanding expression to her deportment. I reported to
Lord Massey, in terms of unexceptionable decorum, those flattering
expressions of homage, which sometimes from the lips of young men,
partially under the influence of wine, had taken a form somewhat too
enthusiastic for a literal repetition to a chivalrous and adoring
husband.
Meantime, the reader has been kept long enough at Laxton to warrant me
in presuming some curiosity or interest to have gathered within his
mind about the mistress of the mansion. Who was Lady Carbery? what was
her present position, and what had been her original position, in
society? All readers of Bishop Jeremy Taylor [Footnote: The Life of
Jeremy Taylor, by Reginald Heber, Bishop of Calcutta, is most
elaborately incorrect. From want of research, and a chronology in some
places thoroughly erroneous, various important facts are utterly
misstated; and what is most to be regretted, in a matter deeply
affecting the bishop's candor and Christian charity, namely, a
controversial correspondence with a Somersetshire Dissenting clergyman,
the wildest misconception has vitiated the entire result. That
fractional and splintered condition, into which some person had cut up
the controversy with a view to his own more convenient study of its
chief elements, Heber had misconceived as the actual form in which
these parts had been originally exchanged between the disputants--a
blunder of the worst consequence, and having the effect of translating
general expressions (such as recorded a moral indignation against
ancient fallacies or evasions connected with the dispute) into direct
ebullitions of scorn or displeasure personally against his immediate
antagonist. And the charge of intolerance and defective charity becomes
thus very much stronger against the poor bishop, because it takes the
shape of a confession extorted by mere force of truth from an else
reluctant apologist, that would most gladly have denied everything that
he _could_ deny. The Life needs more than ever to be accurately
written, since it has been thus chaotically mis-narrated by a prelate
of so much undeniable talent. I once began a very elaborate life
myself, and in these words: "Jeremy Taylor, the most eloquent and the
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